TEN

"Thanks for this."

Makena Kamara-Anderson smiled softly as she walked along the sea front in the city of Brighton, a large portion of fish and chips in her hands, her hair now tied back in to a ponytail since it had been repeatedly getting in to her face.

"I still can't believe that you've never visited Brighton, like who hasn't?"

Lando Norris laughed gently, his eyes sparkling with happiness since they had been in the UK for a few days and decided to make a short trip to the southern seaside city, with the Britsh boy wanting to spend some time with Makena alone.

"Quite a lot of people? I haven't been to Brighton before, and I bet that you've never been to Morecambe." Makena rolled her brown eyes softly at the boy beside her, a small smirk lighting up her face as she noted that he was nodding his head up and down in agreement.

"That's true... though maybe we can plan for a road trip to travel to multiple seaside towns in the UK, what do you think?"

Lando questioned with slight caution in his tone, his voice sounding shaky for a mere moment or so before it evened itself out.

"That sounds great, I look forward to it." The Kamara-Anderson girl smiled, the slightest dusting of a soft pink shade covering her cheeks for a couple of moments before it faded out.

Lando Norris couldn't help but be secretly overjoyed that she had agreed to his suggestion, because whilst they were best friends, he knew that he had begun to feel something else towards her that was slightly different.

By them being together for a road trip and only with each other for so long, it would allow him to figure out just what it was that he was feeling and to what intensity.

He was getting the occasional butterflies whenever he was near her, and his heart would beat faster than normal. He also tended to zone out when staring at her and somehow end up smiling, so he had an idea, but he needed confirmation.

After all, she was his best friend but also his colleague, so he knew that he needed to be one hundred and ten percent sure before he said anything or did anything.

He refused to ruin his friendship and his work relationship with her. She meant too much to him for that.

It had been just over a week since she had mentioned her job interview, and yet she still hadn't heard a response from them, which had caused her to be a little bit nervous and had begun to affect her mood, so it was also part of the reason why Lando had decided to bring her away from it all.

She needed to de stress and relax.

Makena seemed to relish in the fact that she was away from her job and her bosses as well as all of the other media personnel since she felt like she could just have fun without needing to watching her back all of the time.

It also meant that she could spend some time with Lando, just the two of them.

She loved her family, but they were very full on and she just needed time away to calm herself and Lando was the perfect person for her to do that with. Lewis would attract too much attention, and Daniel knew everybody, whereas Lando was known, but not to their extent.

It also helped that he had wore a baseball cap and sunglasses, opting for the standard superhero disguise that always ended up working.

The duo had sat on the beach and sunbathed. They had been to the arcades and won a couple of prizes from it, and they had even played a game of bowling where Makena had completely destroyed her competition with ease.

Makena Kamara-Anderson glanced repeatedly out of the corner of her eye towards her best friend, stealing glances whenever she could in order to try and analyse him, trying to calculate what it was that she was feeling.

She liked him, of course she did, because he was her best friend but part of her brain always did wonder something.

Why did she see Lewis and Daniel as brothers yet Lando as only a best friend? Why was he so different to them?

Then, as their eyes met, it clicked, and she only had one response.

Oh shit.

___________________________________________

"I need advice and no judgement, okay?"

Makena Kamara-Anderson spoke loudly as she marched her way in to the family home, her body rushing towards the kitchen where she knew that her mother would be, seeing the woman waiting for her with a look of intrigue upon her face.

"You won't get any judgement from me, so it's a good thing that your father has gone to a club with half of the grid."

Precious Anderson smiled softly in reassurance as her daughter rushed over towards her in order to hug her, the hands that were wrapped around her frame noticeably shaking.

The mother and daughter duo sat opposite one another at the dining table, their hands outstretched until they were holding each others, with Precious softly grazing her thumb over her little girls hands.

"I think I've started to like Lando, and I need advice on what to do because I don't want to ruin everything."

"Well, it's about damn time." Precious chuckled softly to herself, wrinkles forming around her eyes as a smile lit her face, beaming, filling her face with such happiness and joy.

"What?"

"You don't know if you're going to ruin everything, but surely it's worth telling him so that he knows. If he doesn't feel the same, then you can both move on and stay friends but if it does, then you'll be glad that you didn't just leave it." The Anderson woman reassured her daughter the best that she could, giving advice that she knew was needed yet without saying too much.

She couldn't tell her that she had figured it out that Lando felt similar because they were adults, they needed to figure this out themselves and decide together on what to do.

"So I should go and see him?"

"If you want to see him, you go and see him. Take the car." Precious shot her daughter a soft wink, her painted lips growing in to a smile that was filled to the brim with pride.

"What would dad say?"

"That he wants what is best for you and that if you want to see him, that you should. It won't hurt to be honest with him, darling. Yes, there could be a little bit of momentary embarrassment but that will fade within seconds."

Makena Kamara-Anderson breathed a deep breath of oxygen in to her lungs in order to try and calm herself, her heart beat having been frantic and chaos, her hands shaking with nerves.

She repeated the process, taking a deep breath in followed by a deep breath out and after a couple of tries, she did find herself feeling just a little bit better.

"If I'm not back by evening, I've embarrassed myself massively and probably driven the car off a bridge." Makena shot her mother a short smile, grabbing the car keys and rushing towards the front door.

"I'm kidding about that last part."

"You better be!"

A/N

I am back with this,

What do you think?

Anyway, I hope that you all enjoy this chapter and I'll see you all soon for the next one,

I'm so proud of all of you, my loves

Love you all,

-RUBY 🇵🇸🇨🇩🇸🇸🇺🇦🇸🇩🇾🇪🇱🇧